video

Maybe it’s because I snuck out of my room to watch the Thriller video when it premiered on TV even though my parents told me I wasn’t allowed to watch it and then I bawled all night because I was so terrified. Michael Jackson with yellow eyes dancing in a horror movie within a horror movie within a horror movie. I mean. Come on. Vomit-inducing fear.

Maybe it’s because someone once told me I looked like Jennifer Garner, who once did the Thriller dance in a movie.

Maybe it’s because all the best flash mobs involve bridesmaids dancing like zombies.

It’s possibly because I love hip hop dancing about as much as I am horrible at it. Which is a lot.

Whatever the reason, it’s long been on my bucket list to learn the choreography to Thriller.

And dance it in a group.

This weekend I did it! Dressed as a zombie princess with my daughter, her friend, and yes, my chiropractor, I danced Thriller with 250 other people at the mall.

Our makeup wasn’t all that epic.

I smiled way too much because I could not help myself.

I was more jolly than creepy.

But I seriously had the time of my life.

Apparently every year, people all over the world gather in the name of charity to Thrill the World. They all learn the dance and then perform it together at the same exact time, setting a world record for something.

So Laylee and I headed to the Senior Center Saturday mornings in September and October and dialed up the YouTube in between times to learn the heck out of this dance. Every time the music starts up and we get ready to dance, I tear up. Because that’s what I do. Dance makes me emotional.

During the first class we both just kept looking at each other like, “What did we get ourselves into?” It was way harder than we thought it would be, especially considering half the people in the class were senior citizens and they were rocking it.

The second class was better. We were almost up to old people hip hop levels and by performance day we nailed it. Mostly. My goal for next year is to make it look a little more like dancing and learn how to move my head from side to side like they do in the music video.

I’ve rarely had more fun with my girl and despite the fact that I don’t actually like pouring fake blood on myself and dressing up as a gory brain-eating zombie, I’m willing to pay that price in order to dance like Michael Jackson for a world record and to help disadvantaged kids learn golf. I am that selfless.

You should join us next year. Or should I say, “Next year join us… or we will nom nom your gray matter!”?

The fun thing is that whether you’re reading this in Seattle or Salt Lake City or Vancouver or Tokyo or London, there’s an event in your area and we can all dance together apart next year!

I was at the blood store waiting to have my blood taken when Wanda got bored. She asked if she could take pictures on my phone. I handed it over and she immediately started vlogging. This both delights and scares me.

When I was growing up, I wanted to record things so I carved pictures of myself into stone or recorded my voice on a cassette tape. These were not live streaming, sharable mediums. I could be an idiot and my parents, siblings and a couple of friends were the only ones who knew about it.

Now my kids can share their wisdom with the whole world. Instantly. I’m not ready.

I was listening to NPR while I ran errands this weekend, when Ira Glass suddenly started talking about my hometown, the best hometown I know, Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

The opening segment of This American Life was about different cities’ failed attempts to build town pride through catchy jingles and slogans. Examples he gave were, “Say Nice Things about Detroit,” and “Baltimore – Charm City, USA.” He said that one city where a PR drive to boost city image and morale had actually worked was Calgary, Canada.

He went on to describe a song that was played repeatedly on Calgary TV stations in the 80s, a song that everyone knew and loved, a song that caught on and was a huge success at building hometown pride. I thought, “I grew up in Calgary in the 80s. I know of no such song.”

He interviewed a man who also grew up in Calgary at that time who said that he and all his friends loved the song and could still sing every single word. They would sing it together for fun. Weird. I had no recollection.

Then they played the song. About halfway through, I was overcome with childhood memories. HELLO, CALGARY! I started singing along at the top of my lungs. I could picture the video that went along with it. I knew every nuance of every run the singer belted out. “Makes no difference where I go. You’re the best hometown I know. Hello, Calgary. Hello Cal-ga-a-ry-y! Channels 2 & 7 lo-ove you-ou!”

At this point I was parked at the grocery store, too overcome with unexpected nostalgia to exit the vehicle.

Calgary was a darn stinkin’ great hometown. I was proud to be a Calgarian. The hay bales, the Calgary tower, the missed football catch. All of it came rushing back.

But, wait. There was more. Ira Glass told the man he was going to play him a song he’d probably never heard before. The music started. It was “Hello, Calgary.” But no. It was “Hello Milwaukee”! It was the exact same song but with the name Milwaukee in place of my beloved Calgary.

Apparently Milwaukee was the city it was originally written for. The Calgary version was just a knockoff. And it wasn’t the only one. I screamed, “NO!” out loud.

The guy being interviewed was audibly shocked. He said it was like finding out that the teddy bear you’d grown up loving was owned by 2 other people on the weekends.

Then the montage began. “There’s a feeling in the air that you can’t get anywhere except Pittsburg, Phoenix, Knoxville…” It went on and on. Ira said there were over 100 other cities with “Hello” as their theme song but Calgary was one place it really took off. I think it was this point in the show that I clamped both my hands over my mouth in disbelief. I noticed I was sitting like this when the segment ended, pried them off my face and went in to buy groceries. I’m sort of in shock and the song has not left my head for the last 36 hours.

The story went from shocking to hilarious when Ira Glass interviewed the composer who talked about how for each version of the song he would travel to the city, spend time there, meet the people and tailor it to their specific community. Ira said he could hear no more changes than the name of the city and one or two geographical details in the lyrics.

It’s like that scene from Pillow Talk where Doris Day discovers that Rock Hudson has “written” the same song for her that he’s “written” for every other girl he’s dated.

“There’s a feeling in the air that you can’t get anywhere except Calgary” and everywhere else. Ah, to turn on the radio on a Saturday afternoon and have your favorite talk show host smash a tiny piece of your childhood with a mallet, a strangely hilarious mallet.

Oh, Calgary. You may not have been the first, but I’ll always know that “Hello Insert City Name Here” was actually written for you. The truth is, there can’t be 100 “best home towns I know” and you’re the winner, hands down.

This weekend Dan and I watched Justin Bieber: Never Say Never for our hot date night. I pitched it to him as “a chance to let the magic of documentary film transport us into the world of a strange and interesting new culture.”

Also, he would get to sit really close to me for two hours. Also, he would get to see Jaden Smith perform his first live rap solo at Madison Square Garden. Most people don’t get to perform their first live rap solo at Madison Square Garden but. He’s. That. Good. So there’s that.

I was mostly watching it because a friend dropped it off and told me I had to, because it was directed by Jon M. Chu of Step Up 2: “The Streets” and Step Up 3: “The D” fame, and because of purple.

I won’t bore you with all the details and doubtless you’ve all seen it already.

*cough* American Classic *cough*

I will say that tears were shed as we watched it. To protect the privacy of those involved, I will not tell you by whom the tears were shed or what type of emotions were behind them. I will tell you that the movie makes me question my fashion choices. There’s just something about those bedazzled hoodies… like baby, baby, baby, ooooooh.

If you’re prone to vomit when exposed to extreme cuteness, please do not watch this video of Laylee singing in the Elementary School Musical. It’s like High School Musical but Laylee’s way cuter and more talented than Mr. Zachory Efron and she has more facial hair.

Wanda sleeps beautifully. She eats beautifully. Most nights she sleeps around 14 hours with only one feeding in the middle. The problem is scheduling. She goes to sleep at about seven. I then stay up until around ten…er… eleven… er… twelvish? (If you thought you caught a niner in there as I was trailing off, you were correct) So I go to sleep after she’s been down for about 5 hours. Then she wakes up a couple of hours later to eat and it takes about an hour to feed and change her and put her down. “Put her down” sounds gruesome. Put her to sleep? Also very dire. Put her to bed? So then I get back to sleep at 3 or 4 AM and have to wake up at 7:30 if I’m being a very good mommy to get Laylee and Magoo ready for school while Wanda continues to sleep. I’m just not maximizing her sleeping hours so I end up averaging 5-6 hours of sleep each night with a 1 hour break in the middle. I’m tired.

I find that I am also sore. You may remember Magoo’s hugeness and the number he did on my body. I healed physically within a few months of his birth and expected the same or better this time. Wanda was normal-sized. My body was more fit. The delivery was easy. But here we sit at 4 months postpartum and I’m still in pain. My hips and pelvis aren’t doing so well. I have pain when I lie on my side or lift my leg to put on pants. Stepping over toys on the floor, if anyone ever left toys on the floor of my totally immaculate house which they never would because we are in all ways PERFECT, is a chore that requires careful planning and foot placement. It is uncomfortable to play on the floor with my babies.

The physical therapist says that if I continue doing my exercises twice daily, I’ll likely be feeling good in a year or so. That means 9 months of pretty intense pain during the pregnancy followed by a year of physical recovery. It’s rough but Wanda’s worth it. She’s more than worth it. She’s amazing.

She’s also likely our last.

I hope the physical therapist’s right. I hope my body is able to bounce back. I’m not sure. I’m really not sure if it could do this again. I’m eyeing my box of maternity clothes in the garage with a desire to say farewell and yet a fear of what that symbolizes.

Because tired, sore or broken, I love my babies. Sometimes when I’m feeding Wanda at night I get such a surge of excitement that I choke a little and catch my breath as I hear her little sucking noises and see her tiny fist clinging to my nursing bra like a handle. I always get baby hungry when my kids are around 3 months old and Wanda’s no exception. When she wakes up in the night crying, I go to her and she is overjoyed to see me. Her whole body grins and gasps and she looks up at me with total dependence and adoration. I am her best friend.

She lights up a room. She makes me hungry for more. And then after I catch my breath and squeeze her almost too hard, I realize that I’m a little broken and that I don’t know how much more broken I’ll be if I have another one.

And yet I’m hungry… for babies. I actually started fantasizing the other night about the smell of Tucks Medicated Pads and that sense memory was pleasant to me, making me think about our first several hours together, holding her and exploring her face, counting her fingers and toes. It didn’t make me think of hobbling to the hospital bathroom with the help of a nurse, in pain and bleeding from my body having recently done something that was both ridiculously hard and completely natural.

When I imagine that scent or look at that box of maternity clothes, all I can think about is my three little rays of sunshine, two of whom I sent marching off to bed with much relief tonight due to their foray into complete obnoxiousness, and how I’d like nothing more than to keep manufacturing them forever.

Does it ever stop? The hunger? Even if you know you’re done? Do you ever stop getting tears in your eyes when you pass by the maternity ward in a hospital, see a baby drooling completely vulnerable in his mother’s arms, or smell your older children’s hair right after a bath? Does the ache ever go away? In a way I hope it doesn’t. It tells me I’m alive, that what I’ve done, that what I’m doing, matters. Can I ever do anything better than making these three people? I’m not so sure.

She doesn’t need to be coaxed by a crazy lady with a squeaky high pitched voice but I think she likes to be and I’m happy to provide that service.

I’m not sure why I’m giddy about my almost 2-month-old being able to roll over every time I put her down. My other kids didn’t do it until 3 months of age and with Magoo, I dreaded those milestones because they meant he would get into stuff sooner. For some reason, watching her do this tickles me to no end, except for the part where she smooshes her face into the mirror and cries. That is obviously totally un-fun and also un-funny. The rest is gold.

When she was in utero and she made my abdomen feel like a rubber bag full of ninjas, I sort of had a feeling she’d be a mover and a shaker. I was right. I wonder how long until she’ll be able to fix her own breakfast and get dressed on her own. The other kids can. She just needs to show a little initiative.

It’s been just months now that I’ve been waiting for an excuse to post this video, what I like to think of as the best music video ever made. You have to watch to the end. It’s worth it.

I have to say though that I’m not sure that Danny appreciated the dramatical nature of the material. His timing on the pregnant pause just before singing “–HELLO!” just did not move me the way Mr. Richie’s always has. That could be why he only came in 3rd place.

*For my mom and other non-American-Idol viewers. Danny Gokey, the third runner up this year, sang this song on the season finale tonight, thus giving me the needed excuse to share this nugget of YouTube goodness with the world.*